New Amp: Fortin Beast Mod

[DoomBuggi]

Sold my 1989 Marshall 2203 a few days ago. Something very NasT in the mail, coming to take its place. I'll let you folks know when it arrives, and load some images, too. I don't want to reveal what I am getting, but I'll leave you a hint; It is brand new, has been modded by someone brilliant, is the only one of its kind that has this modification, and is extremely evil.  

I believe that it is a worthy investment, and I also gained a new friendship out of it. This will be my first High Gain amp, and it should work perfect for doing intense music. I feel that I have really lucked out in many aspects. I felt some what sad when my 2203 left my home. The thought of what is coming offered me more than a positive out look however. I am looking forward to melting my own face with this new amp.

Here is a picture of the 2203 that I cared for and sold. Cheers!

[Dmoney]

Very interesting... is it canadian?

[DoomBuggi]

Very interesting... is it canadian?

 I know where you are pointing at, and I think we went back and forth on another thread before about Canadian amps. But, I'm not saying, yet. :censored:
I can say that it is a modded Marshall that is brand new.  It probably isn't quite a Marshall any more.

[Madsakre]

Fortin?

[DoomBuggi]

Well, you guys already guessed it.  It is a brand new Marshall modded by Mike.

[Dmoney]

would love to peep inside that. awesome.

[DoomBuggi]

I bet you do!  Its the Kerry King modded one.  It is the only one on this planet that Mike has modded.  That is to my knowledge.

[Dmoney]

Is it modded? or is it more of a complete rebuild? I think I read that the hulk mod is pretty much a rebuild, if not close to one.
Obviously I'd been keen for details (though I appreciate he runs a business) but I'm also interested in his general approach to these things.

[DoomBuggi]

I'm not quite sure to what extent it has been tweaked.  I know that Mike has re-voiced the gain on both, the JCM side, as well as the Beast side. He also added a toggle on the back that shifts the frequencies, I believe mainly the mids from low mids through high mids.  Think thats a 3-way toggle.  He also added a resonance knob on the back as well that allows one to control the bass response.  Mike made the built in noise gate to work on both modes of the amp instead of just in the Beast mode. 

I originally asked Mike to do the Hulk mod to my JCM 2203.  He told that it is not really a mod, but a complete re-build.  He stated that it was very time consuming, expensive, and after he made the NATAS he discontinued the Hulk Mod.  I believe the Hulk Mod was the precursor to the NATAS.  I had told him that I really wanted the SATAN head, but it would be out of my budget range for awhile.  Thats when he referred me to Ralph of Mod Squad, and told me about the Fortin 2203KK.  He stated that it was really close to the aggression of the NATAS. 
 
 At first, I wasn't into getting the modded 2203KK, but after discussing it with Ralph, I became more and more interested.  I had already thought to try the stock 2203KK because I loved the JCM 800, but wanted a tighter, more aggressive amp.  So after a trillion emails, and some phone calls back and forth from Ralph, I committed to it. Now its in the mail and will be here next week.  Ralph really hooked me up, and he is a really bad ass guy to deal with.

[Alex]

Ohh... I like those Kerry King JCMs! Nice!

[Dmoney]

Cool. Yeah I knew tyhe hulk led up to the natas. Are the natas and satan actually diffeerent heads? The satan might be tweaked but on the face of it they look the same apart from cosmetics. There are various ways to do toggle control mid shifting and general frequency shaping. The resonance mod is a cool addition to an 800! What is mod squad? That's something I don't know about. The revoicing etc sounds interesting. That's the bit I'd like to learn about

[viking]

Well, you guys already guessed it.  It is a brand new Marshall modded by Mike.

  Well,that was not too difficult... :) Congrats, but don't forget to come back to tell us how it sounds !Should be great  8)!

[DoomBuggi]

Cool. Yeah I knew tyhe hulk led up to the natas. Are the natas and satan actually diffeerent heads? The satan might be tweaked but on the face of it they look the same apart from cosmetics. There are various ways to do toggle control mid shifting and general frequency shaping. The resonance mod is a cool addition to an 800! What is mod squad? That's something I don't know about. The revoicing etc sounds interesting. That's the bit I'd like to learn about

There is an actual difference.  The NATAS is the Fortin Stock production model.  The Satan is a custom order for Ola.  It does have different cosmetics, but there have been other modifications as well, and I believe the mods for that amp will be an on going process.

Mod Squad; http://www.facebook.com/ModSquadMusic

Mike Fortin is on RigTalk quite a bit, and you can do a thread search and find a lot of info on his work.  How ever, I'll know more about it once the actual amp gets here. I'm not an amp builder, or an amp modifier, but I can tell you allot about what things do as far as tone/sounds go.  Its more of an abstract analysis, but in the end, the player is the one pushing the tones to their limits.

[ericsabbath]

mike fortin is a really cool guy
he was the only of the big mod guys that tried to help find out who modded my 73 JMP (I've e-mailed a lot of people)
no success, though

he's also a true mod freak and he's always experimenting different tweaks and extra features on his mods

[Dmoney]

alright. that makes sense. so the Satan is a tweaked Natas. I guessed it was a one off for Ola and it was a reasonable assumption it would be tweaked. I'm not sure dudes like Fortin ever really stop tweaking. Not sure if thats good or bad in the long run. good for him at least. ha.

you're right about it being the playing that makes a difference. I've read Fortin's post on rigtalk before, which I think is where I read his debate with Larry. I find Fortin and interesting builder, Eric you're right, I've mailed him before about transformers at the recommendation of a 3rd party and he is really helpful. I think the concept behind the Bones amp is really good. I'm not that interesting in stuff like the Meathead but any amps like that are impressive.